Russell: Domestic, dependent change agents?
By
Steve Russell
|
| Whether the question is war or economics, when the United States gets a cold Indian country sneezes. |
The Civil War was opportunity for some Indian nations but a disaster for mine. The fact that we fought on both sides might have meant that we were winners no matter who won. As it turned out, we were bound to lose no matter who won. The treaty that resolved our Civil War rift with the United States is at the center of our current troubles still being played out in Congress, as well as both U.S. and tribal courts. Opportunity remains in this crisis in that if Cherokee courts reached out to enforce the treaty as a matter of Cherokee law our enemies in Washington would have to eat a lot of words.
World War I was a major driver of U.S. citizenship for Indians, whether we view that as a good thing or not. The argument was that Indians had been subjected to conscription – along with taxation, the disadvantage of citizenship – and therefore deserved the advantages of citizenship.
The chain of events leading to the New Deal were horrible for the United States, but most Indian leaders today would agree that we came out of it better than when we went in. Indians still stuck with Indian Reorganization Act constitutions complain about them for good reason, but the IRA itself and the philosophy driving it made a great deal of political space for self-government that had not existed. Those Indian nations still laboring under IRA constitutions have not been able to agree internally to move on. If they agree internally, the U.S. is politically committed to working with the resulting governments.
| We have to either become economically independent or convince the taxpayers they do in fact owe us a living in perpetuity because of historical wrongs. |
Since a degree of self-government returned to us in a time of crisis, we have had some major difficulties. Most deadly was the “termination and relocation” era of U.S. Indian policy that impoverished individuals as well as tribes. I think we as peoples would do well to understand the impetus for that disaster. The taxpayers do not believe they have undertaken to support Indians forever. We have to either become economically independent or convince the taxpayers they do in fact owe us a living in perpetuity because of historical wrongs. Even if the latter is possible, I suggest that the standard of living that has so far resulted could more accurately be described as “existing.” The United States will not kill us or let us starve, but neither will they provide the kind of education, housing and medical care that the rest of the country expects in the 21st century.
President Obama has promised to support “change,” and Indian country is ripe for it. The question we face is whether our leaders will step forward with plans to become self-supporting over time or whether self-government is nothing but a bunch of rhetoric.
Steve Russell, Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, is a Texas trial court judge by assignment and an associate professor of criminal justice at Indiana University. He is a columnist for Indian Country Today. He lives in Bloomington and can be reached at swrussel@indiana.edu.
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Thursday, Jan 8 at 3:38 PM Wanbli wrote ...
You cannot move foward in reality when you don't understand the structure of the empire that limits your ablilty to proper. The IRA governmental leaders are colonised, corrupt, and selfishly betray's their culture and traditional understanding of soveriegnty. And it will be them that finishes the genocide of our people's and nation's in the end. You have waited far to long for any real change to take place,unless you what to take the mark of the beast for the future of our children, Colonialist.
14585878 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Sunday, Jan 4 at 7:28 PM TheVirginiaHistorian wrote ...
Economic independence comes from: 1)seeding in-home enterprise. 2)developing small businesses nearby. 3)control of tribal industries on tribal lands. Small business allows for individual freedom. In the history of tribes, young would-be war chiefs accepted guns for short term gain by raiding instead of following consensus tribal enterprise in trade. Or traditional leaders gave away tribal inheritance for short term payments to their clan. The issue is What brings long term economic independence?
14393698 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Thursday, Jan 1 at 1:58 AM Sovereignty of one is sovereighty of all wrote ...
I agree with economic independence, as a judge, Russell should know the individual tribal member is the only racial and political minority in America that lacks basic civil rights. The Indian Bill of Rights is a joke. Tribal governments that resemble crime syndicates are the norm, not the exception. Sovereignty is an act of empowering the individual, it cannot exist by denying the rights of the individual members. This is the IRA amuck. If tribes look to DC for sovereignty, all is lost.
14296168 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Wednesday, Dec 31 at 9:13 AM TheVirginiaHistorian wrote ...
The difficulty with the US system of government is that it works, but it works for voters, not residents: voters, win or lose. Not voting erases the community off the political map. Martis’ Political Atlas shows ever shrinking parts of GA, TN, AL 1789-1836 as a grey blanks without Congressional representation. It is the Cherokee Nation. Even if successful in Supreme Court as the Cherokees were, virtual representation is not voter representation.
14265073 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Monday, Dec 29 at 11:55 AM Canuck View wrote ...
This concept of "Indian Country" is too ambigious for 562 First Nations in the States. There are over 700 FNs attached to the Crown in Canada now writing their treaties with the provinces; many of the FNs in the States are already linked via treaties with the USA. It insults the sovereignty of the FNs to lump them into "Indian Country" and it is lazy journalism to pretend there exists homogeny among 562 FNs for the sake of pithy editorialisation.
14189818 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Monday, Dec 29 at 11:51 AM dgilio wrote ...
We already have self governance, but that is different from self support. We must be willing to define for ourselves alternatives to the colonial system we currently have, and continue arguing for a different political paradigm with the US because they won't be compelled to do so on their own without a good reason. Are we willing to continue to settle for being "domestic dependent nations" with the US as our "guardians?" Political Decolonization is the next step for American indigenous peoples.
14189699 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Saturday, Dec 27 at 6:04 AM TheVirginiaHistorian wrote ...
My family includes Algonquin-Powhatan. Community can be expressed through voting for President in a state District Plan. It allows diverse enclaves of geographic, ethnic or economic expression, whenever the people choose, and a two-elector bonus for the state majority. Incorporated tribes concentrate around Fredericksburg in 1st-Va. The unit-rule, winner-take-all, votes a state party, not the people in their diversity. Let the people express differences by choice, and let the differences stand.
14137073 Inappropriate? Alert Us!Add a comment
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